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The most recent episode of Sailor Moon Crystal is now available to view on Crunchyroll, Neon Alley and Hulu. This week’s title is the longest to date as we get Sailor Moon Crystal Act 30, Infinity 4 – Sailor Uranus – Haruka Tenoh – Sailor Neptune – Michiru Kaioh. But is this the title? That is what the original manga chapter is called and from the title card appears to be the proper Japanese title but the Crunchyroll and Hulu subs and page titles call it “Episode 31 – Act.30 INFINITY 4 Haruka Tenoh, Michiru Kaioh – SAILOR URANUS, SAILOR NEPTUNE”. Why change the name like this? Seems an odd choice! This week we continue to deal with drama related to our new friends and Sailor Mercury faces off against Viluy of the Witches 5.

First things first, we have a new opening theme song. Somehow I didn’t realize we were getting it this week. This story arc will actually have three opening and three ending themes. These are the second batch. The opening theme song, In Love With the New Moon, is now sung by Mitsuko Horie who is best known as the voice of Sailor Galaxia. She also covered the Sailor Stars Song as part of the 20th Anniversary Album. It’s a bit odd to hear a slightly changed version of the theme song we’d just started to get used to. I tend to prefer the first version but I wonder if my feelings would change had I heard this one first. I guess we will be getting this version for another few weeks before it is replaced with the Momoiro Clover Z version of the song. They sang Moon Pride for the first two story arcs of Sailor Moon Crystal.

The new ending theme is Maiden’s Advice, sung by Misato Fukuen, the voice of Chibiusa. The ending theme is full of pink and Luna Ps as far as the eye can see. A big change from the last ending theme we had. This will eventually be replaced by Only Eternity Brings the Two Together, sung by Kenji Nojima, the voice of Tuxedo Mask. A CD single with the current opening and ending themes will be released on May 25th, after which I suspect we will be getting the third opening and closing.

As the episode begins it is immediately obvious that these new Sailor Guardians can’t be our friends. Prelude to drama! Sailor Uranus and Neptune straight up attack Sailor Moon and her friends because we sort of have the same mission but we aren’t friends so we just aren’t. In the process Chibiusa immediately betrays her promise to Haruka and Michiru by revealing that Sailor Neptune’s Mirror is a Talisman. Too bad she doesn’t share Hotaru’s secret and tell us who the big bad guy is but whatever we needed to make Ami work a bit this week anyway.

Another shared dream. This one shared by Mamoru and Usagi, who see the “Deity of Destruction”. The Messiah? Looks like Princess Serenity with a staff, maybe a glaive, to me. The two seem surprised to share a dream, even though this has been happening consistently for the past few episodes.

Usagi is chilling in the park and someone comes by from behind covering her eyes with a sort of “guess who” thing. I hate this game, especially when the person who plays it isn’t someone you play it with a lot. Guess right and it’s not a big deal. Guess wrong and it’s drama drama drama. So Usagi guesses Mamoru, which is odd since she recognizes that Haruka smells like Sailor Uranus. I guess she’s bad at this game too. At this point everyone seems to know who’s who and when Haruka gets close… Mamoru shows up!

The drama continues at Mamoru’s apartment and while things are tense Chibiusa crashes the party! She appears to be oblivious to the problem but we eventually learn that her and Diana are actually trying to get them to make up. Chibiusa’s makeup attempt includes making the Holy Grail! This is an odd thing. Chibiusa remembers seeing this item, which Sailor Moon used back in the day aka the future, in a painting in her mother’s room. So the Holy Grail that is made in this episode actually doesn’t exist yet! Mamoru looks up the Holy Grail in “An Encyclopedia of World History”. I don’t really think of the Holy Grail as being a historical object what with it in all likelihood never having actually existed, but whatever. It’s a show about magical girls.

Finally once Chibiusa and Diana are asleep Mamoru and Usagi have a little moment where they both admit to being jealous and then they probably have sex. But Chibiusa and Diana aren’t really sleeping so Chibiusa maybe sees her parents having sex. I guess it’s in Chibiusa’s best interest to encourage her parents to have sex because that’s how she’ll be made some day, unless human sexuality changes drastically in the next seven or so years.

On to part two which has almost nothing to do with the first half of the episode. Ami enrolls at Mugen Preparatory School, which is a sort of high school exam preraration school given at Mugen Academy but with a ton of students from others schools, hence the variety of uniforms. Ami is a genius, so it makes sense that she goes here, but she’s actually investigating too! She goes up to the 13th floor and sees a scale model of a galaxy. I say galaxy of course because I know that’s what it looks like. Yui Bido, actually Viluy of the Witches 5, refers to it as a scaled down universe, and states that it’s the Tau Star System. Let’s correct some confusing terminology here. The Universe is vast and contains at least a hundred billion galaxies. This model contains a single galaxy. This is hardly a scale model of any Universe as we know it. It’s also referred to as the Tau Star System. What exactly does this mean? A solar system is a star with planets and such around it. A star system can mean a few stars orbiting each other, such as a binary star system, but when you get to galaxy scale, containing hundreds of billions of stars, you don’t call things a star system anymore. So much to say, what we see about this thing contradicts the wildly varying things it’s called. It’s not that hard to get these things accurately, especially given Naoko Takeuchi’s interest in space. I’m sure this won’t get better as the story arc proceed and we learn more about the Tau Star System. Everything we know about physics also tells us that you can’t just scale something down like this. Is this galaxy made up of tiny stars with tiny planets around them filled with tiny people made up of tiny cells and tiny molecules made up of tiny atoms? Whatever. It’s a show about magical girls.

Ami starts to poke around. She throws a pen into a camera which is bad ass. She’s on the 13th floor. She sees a door that is labeled “Underground laboratory”. She’s on the 13th floor and sees a door that leads to a lab which is under the ground, generally accepted to be at floor one. In there she finds Daimons and the enemy shows up. She’s underground at this point. She runs to the nearest window and … she’s back on the 13th floor! What exactly is going on here with a dedicated stairwell that goes down 13 floors but doesn’t open up to any other floor? Is there some sort of portal through space that leads from one floor to another? Anyway Ami is totally bad ass again by jumping out the windows, diving into a pool and transforming while diving, emerging as Sailor Mercury. Pretty awesome. Reminds me a bit of Ami’s first transformation in the live action series which is done while she’s falling.

Sailor Mercury fights Viluy who fights with nano robots. Advanced technology which is basically a swarm of tiny robots all working in unison for something. For whatever reason the cloud of nanobots appears as formulae over Sailor Mercury. Why not? Sailor Uranus and Neptune appear and transform for the first time. The transformation sequences are brief and similar to those from the original Sailor Moon anime. After a few attacks magic beats technology yet again. Viluy’s power level was 202. I’m not sure how accurate this scale really is, but they keep using it. The page of the book which the Holy Grail appears on happens to be 202. What an odd reference.

Finally we see an old friend. Reika and Motoki are at the University and we see a new first year student, Setsuna Meioh. If the resemblance was not immediately obvious this is the civilian identity of Sailor Pluto, who died last season in the distant future.

Next week is Act 31, Sailor Pluto – Setsuna Meioh, in which we will see Sailor Pluto once again.

Keep reading for more screenshots from this episode and the preview for Act 31.

I really really liked this episode. I liked the transformations (they weren’t that bad), i liked Space Sword Blaster(i think that’s it’s name right? ) I know , Sailor Neptune’s violin attack it was kind of silly and confusing but it was too funny to be mad at it,I loved how they showed Setsuna in the end and how she was kind of mysterious (even though we all knew that she was Sailor Pluto), the ending was not very good but it was too cute to be mad at it, and the best for the last, Sailor Mercury(Ami Mizuno)was such a badass in this episode, she finally was acting smart by destroing the camera with her pen and then investigating on the Mugen Academy and her transformation OMG this was Mercury we all wanted to se since the beginning of SMC an Ami that is literally smart not just for her grades but an Ami that is smart and badass everytime that she need to

They’re referencing Tau Ceti system specifically in this one, I think the odd look of the model is mostly to make it look alien and “wrong.”
Another way to translate 箱庭宇宙(hakoniwa uchuu) would be something like “miniature space” as 宇宙 just means space (宇宙人 means alien btw, literally “space person.”)
箱庭 “Hakoniwa” more literally would be something like “box garden” but refers to a miniature garden.

It kinda already happend, its not major or anything but Shingo (Usagis brother) have a full team of eevees named after the sailor scouts. I know you probably want more than this but it is canon atleast

Oh and one more thing, my Japanese isn’t perfect, but the subs for Crystal can be a bit off or even very off sometimes. So beware of that, especially with space terminology as that can be more difficult to translate, especially if the translator isn’t super into that. Japanese is very vague sometimes and there are opportunities for puns that don’t exist in English 惑星ネメシス (Waku Nemesis) comes to mind there. Yes it can mean Planet Nemesis but if you look at first kanji it’s “delusion” and the second “star/planet” which fits it pretty well.

I liked this episode, especially Uranus and Neptune’s transformations. They’re understated but elegant, beautiful in their simplicity. And didn’t the falling transformation thing happen in a few other animes? Either way, it’s cool.

Also, I love the new ending theme! It’s just so innocent and cutesy and kind of relaxing to listen to, not to mention watch. I’m looking forward to seeing the full song released.

Also, how do Usagi and Chibiusa get away with staying at Mamoru’s so often? Do they just call up Mrs. Tsukino and say, “Yeah, we’re staying at Ami’s house to study!” And then they call up Ami and are like, “Ami, we’re having a sleepover at Mamo-chan’s! Cover for us, okay?” And then when tests return, Mrs. Tsukino is like, “You stay at Mizuno-chan’s all the time! Why aren’t your grades improving?”
And I’m starting to wonder if I’m thinking too deeply on this.

The episode as a whole specifically Ami’s scenes in this episode are the types of battle and scenes that make you hyped to watch. If only each episode had the amount of awesomeness of when Ami/Sailor Mercury went to battle/investigate. They did change some things from the manga, but what they kept really made this episode amazing. The animation was better than the last episode as well. If only every episode could be like this. I was scared they would not be able to pull it off, but they did.

Now the bad is in the form the episode title namesake. I think this is the manga’s fault since crystal follows closer to the manga than the original anime series. This act is supposed to be titled sailor Uranus and sailor Neptune, Haruka Michiru infinity 4. What a title. However, we learn nothing about Haruka or Michiru. I feel bad for them because they really have had no development especially Neptune we learn she plays guitar on her violin? Their transformation sequences are a let down. I can’t believe I got hyped for weeks for a complete repeat of the old anime. At least the inner soldiers especially Mars got such a new take on the old transformation. The outer’s old anime transformation was boring as well and they managed to do nothing to make it better. For a second in the beginning of Uranus’s transformation it looked like they were trying different angles if not a completely new transformation, but nope. I also missed them using the transformation pens, but that would not have made the actual transformation any better. The speech sequence was better, but was not as good compared to the inner senshi’s speech animation.

Considering Pluto or Saturn do not transform in the actual manga series until the next story arc this was a double dose of disappointment that they did nothing to make Uranus and Neptune’s transformation sequence or speech sequence more interesting.

I really liked that they kept Mercury’s falling transformation, that happened in the manga and was awesome then.

Mu is right, the subtitles are often pretty wrong, I’m still pretty sure Venus’ speech is wrong too. They’ve also changed the subs for it at least once.
And I remember the Mixx manga translated that as something like: “I’ll rain down your punishment from heaven”.

that’s so true but with any subs or groups, im not that good at it either but you can blantly hear some words ever now and then and they type something entirely different, that is really apparent in the stars arc of the 90s series that was just officially released, just hope they keep up the work and we get the dream and stars arcs after this

Also, the picture beside the Grail kind of looks like the Stallion Reve.
The Holy Grail here looks nothing like the one in Neo Queen Serenity’s room…maybe the one in the room is actually a third form, or an alternate form.
Did the model Usagi and Mamo made change it’s appearance?

The Holy Grail is associated with the Holy Chalice, which is the vessel that Jesus Christ used to serve wine at the Last Supper. Replicas are being used today in Christian ceremonies of the Eucharist. The Holy Chalice is part of human history or tradition whatever it is. See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Chalice

Christianity put aside, the Holy Grail is the symbol of the unification of man with God (or Nature, if people prefer). This is an artifact that symbolizes the universal mystery of life, and owning the Holy Grail is like becoming the very source of life and power itself… This representation of the Holy Grail is very significant for example in some esoteric traditions. The search for the Holy Grail, in the Arthurian Literature, is an initiatic journey. Finding the Holy Grail might lead to become as almighty as “God”. But also, while the King and his Knights are on the way to find this sacred artifact, they learn about life and they become wiser, until they become wise men, with or without the Holy Grail. In Sailor Moon, the Holy Grail is very important when we know that Sailor Moon is an avatar of Sailor Cosmos, that is to say “the ultimate power”, the never ending principle of life and death, creation and destruction always renewed…

The Holy Grail can also represent the never ending desire for life and power that is in all men. A never satisfied desire… The Holy Grail represents our thirst for what we call the “absolute”.

I don’t really know how to explain it properly in English, I miss the adequate vocabulary.

Sounds scholarly Aurelia. I really like your explanation. Do you know the song “Love me like you do” by Ellie Goulding?
There is a line in there referencing the Holy Grail:
“Every inch of your skin is a holy grail I’ve got to find”

I was wondering about the turning to the side too… they’re straight up on their foreheads when they transform and then they’re to the side when the tiara’s go on… so random, I wonder if that’s a Naoko move or what the thought process is on that. It bugs me. #ocd

I have the same reaction and the same questions but… I think there is no thought process behind it all XD . Someone at Toei (Naoko Takeuchi or someone else) has surely thought it was a cool stuff to do, for no reason, and then everyone agreed >_< … If something is twisted in an anime for no reason, that's pretty sure Toei is behind .

Such a random bizarre thing, and so glad I’m not the only one it bugs. By that same token, if this is what we’re bitching about then they’re doing a much better job this season. (Outer henshin’s still a let down though…)

Thank you Matt for the picture ! At least in the old anime there was a meaning to the turning to the side, and the movement of the symbols coming back to their right position was pretty.

But in the new season… this is just meaningless.

Oh yes, personally I’m just bitching about this and the Outers’ transformations (Toei should have given them new and longer choregraphies, like they did for the Inners), but for the rest, I really enjoy the third season. Indeed, Toei has greatly improved its work.